Nobility and Family in Medieval France: A Review Essay
1990; Duke University Press; Volume: 16; Issue: 3 Linguagem: Inglês
10.2307/286489
ISSN1527-5493
Autores Tópico(s)Historical Studies and Socio-cultural Analysis
ResumoIt is just fifty years since, on the eve of the Second World War, two scholars of consummate talents set forth ideas about social elites in the Middle Ages that have influenced historical discussion ever since. Marc Bloch conceived of nobility as a great creation of the eleventh and twelfth centuries, the juristic transformation of meritocracies formerly lacking the attributes of blood and patrimonial inheritance. Qui noblesse, wrote Bloch, dit quartiers [heraldic pedigrees]. En l'espece, les quartiers n'importaient point, parce qu'il n'y avait pas de noblesse. This maturely challenging opinion differed radically from that of the young Gerd Tellenbach, who argued not only that the Frankish counts and dukes of the ninth century constituted a nobility but also that they formed a distinctively imperial elite, a Reichsaristokratie with possessions and connections throughout the Carolingian Empire. ' These inherently contradictory views were never debated on their merits. They were the obiter dicta of historians engaged on other, divergent tasks. Tellenbach was trying to redo the political history of post-Carolingian Germany; Bloch was trying to redo the social history of post-Carolingian Europe. What might have happened if Bloch had survived the war is difficult to say. But it is a curious lesson in the fates
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